More That I Don’t Understand

I puzzle every day about things that don’t add up. I actually enjoy a world with lots of question marks in it, but I think that’s mainly because I like the human process of discovery.

To size up a political candidate’s thinking process accurately, it is best to have some information about his past before he ran for office. Obama has an obscure past, but now that the sanctioned candidate has gone on record, we are more likely to hear the demographically designed media mind mangling which is familiar to the seasoned observer.

Yes, I believe this is what one euphemistically refers to as ‘spin’.

Unemployment, foreclosures, business failures and essentially all the leading indicators one associates with a bear market, seem strangely disconnected as the stock market is bounding upwards today on a supply of optimism I do not share. Nevertheless, I hope wall street knows something substantially factual about the general state of our economy that all this is based on. I would prefer now to be wrong. We need a very long rally.

I render to the reader my own opinions as to the new drivers in the world of stocks and bonds:

There are enough new dollars suddenly appearing in the world economy to threaten a few hectares of forest. Ah, but this is incorrect really, as cotton and linen comprise the bulk of our currency, so I guess the trees are still safe.

Also, The Fed is buying our own treasury bonds to “shore up confidence” in our national debt. This has pushed down yields and made more than a few economists add a few ropes to their furrowed brows. Still, China, though making noise about abandoning the dollar, appears to be cautiously studying us in a manner that reminds me of a past neighbor boy who used to time how long mice could hold their breath under a bucket of water before drowning (he must have realized early in his demented ten-year-old life, that mice emit carbon dioxide). There is here in symbol if not from economic history, a recognized time lag before collateral consequences set in. I personally hold no records for holding my breath, but I do believe that for some speculators, the contrived rule that we are ‘too big’ to fail, is encouraging some of the new buying.

In the energy sector, evil oil and evil coal are going to be produced less in the United States. Obama’s new interior secretary feverishly shut down dozens of new oil leases and Obama certainly made no secret of his desire to “bankrupt” the coal industry, primarily with the use of another contrivance of this century, the carbon emissions penalty. Never mind that a ton of coal only costs about four dollars (roughly 150 times cheaper than diesel) that we are in a century long record breaking solar minimum and also currently experiencing a ten year decline in world temperatures. Global warming still remains a liberal article of faith for Obama. Humans, of whom we are told number way too many, have supposedly caused global warming with all of our unnecessary wanton good living. Shame on us! Obviously, if Obama is going to create a shortage in fossil fuels, then of course, energy stocks are going to go up . . . even though vacations will go down.

What if we have global cooling next? How will this be our fault too?

So we have a less guilt-ridden alternative right? Obama has a “renewable energy plan”? The only thing really standing of record is a 17 billion dollar tax incentive. If America threw 200 billion dollars in hard cash into windmills and solar farms, we might add 3% to our energy needs . . . after about ten years of intensive effort. But perhaps with government-assisted partial birth abortion and legalized euthanasia, I am sure we can cut down on our need for more power in the Obama future.

Fiat, an Italian automaker which specializes in particularly claustrophobic transportation devices, was shrewdly turned down by GM on February 13, with a 2 billion dollar buyout, a survival strategy designed to prevent a contractual merger which probably would have driven American stock holders away in disgust. Fiat, which coincidentally has been loosing about 2 billion dollars a year since 2000, has longstanding and parasitic leftist labor contracts that make the UAW contracts look downright accommodating. Now it appears, that Chrysler is being strong-armed by the Obama team to buy Fiat

. . . or else! Or else what?

Nobody seems to really know why the American Taxpayer has to pay for Fiat’s bail out too. I can only guess at Obama’s reasoning. Perhaps he believes he can force teeny-weeny cars into the American market place after the price of gasoline hits twelve dollars a gallon. Perhaps we need to double the fatal auto accident rate in these cute little death traps, so mommy earth will not have to support as many human life forms. Perhaps we all just need to rethink our commitment to the good life, settle down and buy more stock in our demise. What this all seems to add up to is this:

We need to die.

As most people know by now, weak banks are being fed bailout cash like cotton candy at the fair, while stronger more responsible banks are carrying their own lunch. Of course, in addition to the bailout money come the strings. Bonus money is now taboo and the best executive talents these banks had are being tossed ceremoniously onto the public pyre. Why Wall Street is now eager to replace these executive managers, with government-appointed gnomes, who may have previously had careers at the DMV or IRS, is a mystery to me.

Again, I just don’t know. The last time I was at the IRS, I left counting my fingers, just to make sure they were still there. The last time I was at the DMV, I got the wrong form and had to stand in the same line twice. Take a number folks, its time for nationalized banking.

How do you buy a toxic asset and make it go away, anyway? The last time I bought a gallon of sour milk, I was still short two bucks and I still had to throw it away.

Well, we still have some manufacturing left in this country right? The future of manufacturing in America looks promising right? You should hear the ‘American’ businessmen I deal with, who often contemptuously scoff at bidding even the smallest iota away from cheap Chinese manufacturing.

But let’s be fair. In the United States, manufacturing is taxed on capital gains, high environmental permit fees and enough red tape to fell King Kong – and easily discourage manufacturing in general. But, couple this fact, that many of these business taxes, including our personal income taxes, support a world wide defense umbrella for which America is significantly encumbered. We are thus relieving the commensurate amount of capital from competing nations who would otherwise pay well for their own defense (Japan and South Korea to name a few).

There’s a nearly-dead city called Detroit and there’s a thriving city in Washington D.C. Hear this “tale of two cities.” Washington D.C. has produced more business for Japan, Germany, France and England during the past 20 years than it ever did for American Auto manufacturers. True, democrats do have a love affair with the UAW voting block, and have helped ensure its deteriorating competitiveness with its usual politically incestuous arrangements, but damn it, Americans have an obligation in this country to buy the best automobiles at the best price, even when foreign companies like ‘Fiat’ are heavily subsidized by their governments. How, for instance, does a powerhouse like Boeing Aircraft lose a bidding war for the new airforce refueling tanker? Airbus, a German aircraft manufacturer, pays for inside information from an American congressmen, and then it nudges the German government to subsidize its shortfall. No surprise then, when Airbus wins the contract.

America, Boeing . . . you lose.

The M1A2 main battle tank, arguably the finest death machine in its class, is produced in America right? Well, some of it is. It’s Allison Turbine power house is made in France, it’s radio and fire control electronics are full of Japanese parts and a NATO treaty contract keeps this weapon in tow for years to come with foreign business.

By the way, what part of NATO comes to our aid if we are under attack?

We used to dominate the steel industry, textiles, lumber, refining, chemicals and a long list of bedrock concerns, now lost to countries like Japan, China, Canada and even India. Many times foreign countries can obtain leases for extracting American resources easier than we can, and if they can’t, they may even tap an oil well anyway, like China recently did 60 miles off shore from Florida.

“I drink your milk shake,” is true.

We still sit on mountains of ore, coal, lakes of oil, idle farmlands, which are the envy of the world and we invented many of the chemical processes now used around the world.

Thousands of German chemists came to America over half a century ago because the rewards of American industry beckoned them. The Chemist, with whom I share both passion and profession, used to belong to an esteemed science. The word ‘chemical’ now seems to sit in the American lexicon next to Mafia and Cancer. This is unfortunate, both for Americans who send good paying jobs overseas and for validating the American myth making media machine.

We still make delicious hamburgers and good houses in the United States. Unfortunately, according to most experts, we make too many of both. It’s as if Americans want to be productive. Its as if Americans need to make stuff as a byproduct of its essential character. Many Americans still have this old habit of striving to be the best. It’s as if the American dream wants to come back. Perhaps the stock market wants America to come back so badly, it is now fueled primarily . . .

. . . By this want.

Milton